Greg Jefferson: Council splits over planning appointments

When it came time today to make at-large appointments to the planning commission, the City Council snapped along the North-South divide.

Currently, the council’s infrastructure committee vets applicants to the commission — one of the city’s few heavyweight panels — and sends a slate to the entire council for a vote. But Councilman Justin Rodriguez wants all applicants to get a hearing from him and his colleagues.

He pushed to put off three re-appointments (Cecilia Garcia, Amy Hartman and John Friesenhahn) and a new appointment (Stephanie James) until the council hashed out how best to select planning commissioners, all of whose seats are at-large.

Rodriguez’s gambit almost succeeded. His amendment fell just one vote short (5-6).

His support came from Mary Alice Cisneros, Lourdes Galvan, Roland Gutierrez and Philip Cortez. In others words, representatives of San Antonio’s inner city and West and South sides lined up behind him. (Also worth noting: all but Gutierrez are council new-comers.)

If that sounds boring even by government standards, keep in mind that in San Antonio a stigma hangs over the phrase “at-large.” Prior to the adoption of single-member districts in the mid 1970s, all council seats were at-large, a council majority elected the mayor, North Siders (the kingmakers in most citywide elections) were over-represented and the poorer parts of town often got the shaft.

Hence the ongoing wrangling about how to make at-large appointments.

In the wind-up to his amendment, Rodriguez said at-large boards and commissions, like the planning commission, should represent “a cross-section of our communities,” as far as ethnicity, gender and income.

But Councilwoman Sheila McNeil — head of the committee that vets planning commission applicants — pointed out that the current system is relatively new and untested.

“I was here last term,” McNeil said, “and we were trying to set up a process that was more efficient.”

In its previous term, the council ditched the approach Rodriguez is now advocating, essentially saying it was too cumbersome.

Rodriguez wrote a memo in September calling for consideration of the policy change, and got four other council members to sign it — the same four who voted with him on the amendment today. The document spurred talk that a bloc is taking shape on council, centered primarily on Rodriguez, Cortez and Gutierrez.

More inside baseball, but still significant — perhaps a sign of a subtle shift in power on the council, one in which the rookies play a significant role.

Council members use five-signature memos to get pet projects and issues important to them on the agenda.

A review of all five-signature memos filed since June showed that Rodriguez, Cortez and Gutierrez combined more than a quarter of the time — in six out of 23 memos. If that represents a bloc, it’s a pretty meek one.

After his amendment collapsed, Rodriguez was the only council member to vote against the four appointments.